HARP-LUTE, or Dital Harp, one of the many attempts to
revive the popularity of the guitar and to increase its compass,
invented in 1798 by Edward Light. The harp-lute owes the first
part of its name to the characteristic mechanism for shortening
the effective length of the strings; its second name — dital harp —
emphasizes the nature of the stops, which are worked by the
thumb in contradistinction to the pedals of the harp worked
by the feet. It consists of a pear-shaped body, to which is added
a curved neck supported on a front pillar or arm springing from
the body, and therefore reminiscent of the harp. There are
12 catgut strings. The curved fingerboard, almost parallel with
the neck, is provided with frets, and has in addition a thumb-key
for each string, by means of which the accordance of the
string is mechanically raised a semitone at will. The dital or
key, on being depressed, acts upon a stop-ring or eye, which
draws the string down against the fret, and thus shortens its
effective length. The fingers then stop the strings as usual
over the remaining frets. A further improvement was patented
in 1816 as the British harp-lute. Other attempts possessing less
practical merit than the dital harp were the lyra-guitarre, which
appeared in Germany at the beginning of the 19th century;
the accord-guitarre, towards the middle of the same century;
and the keyed guitar. (K. S.)